Happy Thoughts in the Hidden Room
by BatKate
Summary: "For your first time patronus you need something really strong. Like … real joy." She sighed. "It's hard to be happy during a war."


_I managed to write one more fic for Hannah/Neville week over on Harry Potter Ship Weeks. Please note that this one is not in canon with the other fic I wrote and it is very much rated M — I hope you all like it!_

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"Stupid — bloody — thing!" Hannah said in frustration, sending hexes across the room. Most were absorbed into the wall, but a handful struck a poor practice dummy that the younger students hadn't bothered to put away the day before.

"Your offensive work is getting better."

She whipped her head towards the familiar voice to see a familiar face. A familiar, handsome face that she really didn't want to see right this moment.

"I thought you were at dinner," she said, still panting, "With Shay and Ginny."

He shrugged as he walked further into the Room of Requirement. "Ate quick."

Hannah looked at him with raised eyebrow.

"And I didn't see you at the Hufflepuff table," Neville said, moving closer to her.

"Worried about me, were you?" she asked tersely.

"Maybe a little," her boyfriend shrugged again, "Mostly just wanted to see you." He gave her a shy smile. "I've missed you."

She sighed. Here she was ready to have a row and here he was being all wonderful — typical Neville. But it was true … they hadn't seen each other very much in the last week or so. With the Carrows looking out for possible proof of Dumbledore's Army members, Neville had ordered everyone to avoid talking with members in other houses in public. That meant pretty much everywhere but DA meetings … meetings where both of them were busy getting work done. She really did miss spending time with him, especially now that they were—

"Your hexes _are_ looking better, though," Neville said, breaking her thoughts. And then she remembered why she was there.

"Yeah," Hannah scoffed, "Except that wasn't even what I was working on."

"What—" Neville started, but something must have clicked when he looked at her. "Oh. Because of what Corner and Sue Li heard?"

She nodded.

"Han," he said, "you don't have to worry. You know we're covering patronus charms in the next meeting—"

"That's right, Neville," Hannah snapped, "and I don't want to be standing with the younger kids getting taught." Yes, she knew that they were going to be doing patronuses tomorrow — after Sue and Michael overheard the Carrows talking about adding more Dementors around the school, the DA heads had agreed that they'd be pushing up the patronus lesson to pre-holidays. She had been planning to use the Christmas break to catch up on certain things … including figuring out how to make a bloody patronus. So here she was, standing in the RoR for the good part of an hour with nothing to show for it except tense muscles and that slightly charred dummy.

She turned away from him, rubbing her face with her empty hand. "I feel so stupid when I'm learning the lessons instead of helping you and Gin and Luna and Shay—"

"Hannah," Neville said, coming up in front of her and putting his hands on her shoulders, "You are so not stupid. You were a bloody prefect, for crying out loud … you know, back when we _had_ prefects. And practically all of the 6th and 7ths have been on the student side of meetings. You helped Seamus with relashio and I had to have Ginny teach impedimenta—"

"But I mess up so much. And I missed most of last year," she said. "I feel like I'm catching up to everything."

Neville snorted. "Do I need to remember who was teaching DADA last year? I mean, Snape was better than Umbridge but it wasn't like we were taught a lot of practical stuff either. And the window light kept reflecting off his hair gel. Way too distracting, didn't learn a thing."

Hannah laughed despite herself — Neville always seemed to know how to make her laugh.

"You're very smart, Hannah," he continued, "but you get flustered when you make a mistake and then you're convinced you can't do it. I, uh …" he rubbed his neck, "I might know a little bit about how that is."

Hannah smiled sadly — he wasn't just saying that to make her feel better. She knew better than most how deep his insecurities went, even with all he had done over the past couple months for the DA and for the young kids and … for her.

"Besides," he said as he brushed her hair behind her shoulder and moved his hand up the curve of her neck to her jaw, "you're catching up so much on what you missed. Sprout told me a few days ago how impressed she was at you breezing past last year's Herbology lessons."

"Yeah well, that's Herbology," Hannah said, daring to look him in the eyes. "Apparently I'm rubbish at patronuses."

She waited for him to tell her not to worry, that most adults didn't know the spell let alone cast a full patronus anyway. But instead he moved a little to her side.

"Can I watch you practice?" he asked. "Maybe I can help."

"What," she gave him a skeptical look, "fearless leader giving a one-on-one lesson?" He did another little shrug as if to say "Why not?"

She exhaled and moved a little forward. "Sure, Professor." She didn't mean for it to sound so flirty. And the little chuckle he gave did not help her concentration as she raised her wand. She took a deep breath, remembered back to an envelope with red wax and—

"Expecto patronum!" Despite putting as much confidence in her command as she could (as if that would pressure the stupid thing to come out of her wand already), there was only a short spurt of white light that fizzled out into nothing.

"See?" Hannah looked to Neville. "It just keeps doing that."

"What memory were you using?" he asked.

She shifted on her feet. "When I got my Hogwarts letter."

Neville stared (almost gaped) at her. "Han, that is not a strong enough memory."

"What do you mean?" she said just a little defensively, "I was very happy in that memory."

"But you're a halfblood. You've known you were going to Hogwarts."

"No one ever really knows, Neville. I could have been a squib."

"Han," he said with an incredulous scowl, "you were never going to be a squib. Anyway, the memory might work when you get used to the charm, but for your first time patronus you need something really strong. Like … real joy."

She sighed. "It's hard to be happy during a war."

He paused, knowing as well as she did that things were getting worse every day, even with the DA gaining some momentum in the school.

"Well, there are some bright moments," he said as he moved behind her. "Remember our first date?"

Hannah smiled. Hogwarts had only one Hogsmeade trip before the trips had been canceled school-wide — punishment for the DA messages being left around the castle.

"We got caught in the rain in between the castle gates and the Three Broomsticks," Neville continued, "and you were worried about me using my jacket to cover us."

"You could have caught cold," she protested, noticing how his hands were on her shoulders now with his lips by her ear.

"You were right up against me, Hannah … I wasn't going to complain." His hands moved down to her arms. "What about when I walked you to your room?"

"I was so nervous."

"_You_ were nervous?" he said incredulously.

She nodded. "I still wasn't sure it was a date-date. I kept bracing myself for you to say 'Good talk, Abbott. See you at the next meeting.'"

"Huh," he said, clearly just now considering some things. Namely that she had actually fancied him pre-that day. _Boys._

Snapping out of his thoughts, he smiled a kiss into her skin. "Well, I guess me kissing you cleared things up." Before she had a chance to respond he said, "What about that time in my dorm? That was a happy memory, wasn't it?"

"Oh lord," she sighed, putting her hand to her face in embarrassment, "I still can't believe Seamus didn't wake up."

She could feel him roll his eyes. "Considering how many times this semester he's forgotten to put up a silencing charm with Lavender … anyway," he said, his right hand moved down to her thigh, bunching up her skirt, "Shay could have raised hell all night and I wouldn't have cared. It was the best night ever." And then his fingers up her reached between her legs and cupped her.

She moaned. "Nev—"

"What? You said I was good at it."

"You are," she said. Goodness knows he was good at it. "But I'm supposed to be practicing."

"You need a happy memory," he said as his left hand went up to the opposite breast, "I'm just making a new one."

She would have protested more, but he chose that moment to slip past her knickers and start a light caress.

"Nev," she moaned again, putting her head against his shoulder while her left hand went over his own and her right gripped his thigh. He really was excellent with his fingers — she had learned as much that night in his dorm. She rolled her hips in rhythm with his fingers.

"That's right, love," he muttered against her neck just under her ear, "You like me doing this, don't you?"

Already in a haze, she managed to nod. "You're so good, Nev. So good."

"Oh," he grinned, "You haven't see anything yet."

She gasped as he started pumping — it wasn't the gentle, almost reverent petting that he had stuck to when they had first tried this. No, this was firm and a little faster and oh lord, he was curling his fingers a little and hitting just the right spot. She didn't think of the war or her mother's grave or what would happen when the Carrows decided they were all too much trouble to keep alive. All she knew was his fingers and the bubble that was building up just under her navel. It didn't take long after that moment of clarity for her to orgasm, her body tensing in the very best way as the pleasure flooded her. Her cry echoed in the almost empty room and she collapsed against his chest, the brilliant aftershocks hitting her from his fingers still pumping softly against her clenching muscles. Once she came down from the high, he slowly slipped out of her, rearranging her knickers and skirt before wrapping his arms around her. She could feel how he was panting along with her.

"You look so bloody beautiful when you do that," he finally whispered against her temple. Then he cleared his throat. "Was it … was it alright?"

Hannah actually let out of giggle before turning towards him and putting her hand on his jawline. "Yes … I would say that was more than satisfactory."

"Do you want to try?"

She met his eye in a challenge. Her hands inched down his front before he halted their movement.

"No," he said quickly, half laughing, "I meant, the patronus."

She almost burst out laughing herself. "Oh right. The patronus."

"But if you're that eager …" she heard behind him.

"Oh shush, Longbottom. I'm trying to focus," she said as she got back into position. Taking another big breath, she closed her eyes and imagined what just happened. The warmth of his body against hers. Her fantastic boyfriend concentrating just on bringing her pleasure. The freedom and ecstasy of that moment when she came around his fingers.

"Expecto patronum!"

The first thing she noticed with the force pushing against her hand from the wand.

"Hannah, look!"

She opened her eyes and and gasped at the light shooting out hard, blooming into a lithe animal figure. The creature was hazy at first, but soon materialized into something between a weasel and a badger.

"It's a pine marten," Neville said. "You can't find them south but I've seen them up here."

"I've seen them, too … near the Forbidden Forrest. God, she's so pretty," Hannah said in awe as the pine marten continued scampering through the air in front of her. She felt like laughing or dancing or … something. So when Neville came up beside her, she practically jumped into his embrace.

"I did it! I can't believe I did it!"

"You're brilliant, you know," Neville said as she grinning against his chest, "Absolutely brilliant." When she looked back at the room, she was a little sad to find her patronus had dissolved.

"I hope I can do that again," she thought outloud.

"You've got nothing to worry about," he said. "The first time is always the hardest. And now you know you can do it."

She watched him for a moment before speaking her mind. "Thank you. For the help, I mean."

"Well, it's not like I was miserable during it," he said with a twinkle in his eye, "I love doing stuff with you. And with everything that's happened, I needed a new happy memory, too."

The next day, as the the patronus lesson went as planned and Neville's toad burst forward from his wand (to the amazement of the younger DA members), he made a point of looking right at Hannah and winking. She couldn't help but blush knowing which memory he used.


End file.
